Use This Subplot to Bring Depth to Your Story

This week’s video suggests the value of an “emotional subplot” to bring instant depth to any character.

Video Transcript:

Subplots are surprisingly misunderstood among writers, primarily because the best subplots are natural offshoots of the plot itself. They’re so integral to the plot that they’re basically inextricable from it. Let me just start today with a really basic definition of the subplot. In a nutshell, the subplot is a thematically related exploration of a minor part of the character’s personality. As such, subplots are vital for providing both contrast within the plot—for example, they allow us to give readers a “break” from the main plot—and for allowing us to introduce character depth via situations that would be off-limits in the main part of the plot.

We find perhaps the most obvious example of this in action-driven stories, since the contrast is particularly evident. For example, in C.S. Forester’s acclaimed Hornblower series, the plot is very obviously about the action—it’s about Captain Hornblower’s naval adventures during the Napoleonic Wars. Forester could easily have left his stories at that, and they probably would still have been popular. But he notched it up by introducing a minor subplot about Hornblower’s domestic life—his somewhat accidental marriage, his struggles to relate emotionally to his wife, and his desire to provide for his family.

I like to call this an “emotional subplot.” It’s not there to drive the plot forward so much as it is to introduce humanizing facets of the character. It makes the protagonist relatable and compelling in ways readers wouldn’t be able to access if the author focused totally on the main plot. Some stories, of course, are all about the emotional angle. But if you’re writing a plot-driven story, always take a minute to contemplate how you can bring considerable depth to your story by expending just a little effort on an emotional subplot.

Tell me your opinion: Does your story have an emotional subplot?

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K.M. Weiland lives in make-believe worlds, talks to imaginary friends, and survives primarily on chocolate truffles and espresso. She is the IPPY and NIEA Award-winning and internationally published author of the Amazon bestsellers Outlining Your Novel and Structuring Your Novel. She writes historical and speculative fiction from her home in western Nebraska and mentors authors on her award-winning website.

If I’m understanding your definition — and I very easily might not — then I have four subplots, one for each of my central characters: the main plot is about their fight against the bad guy and his effects; but one man also feels under-valued, another that he was forced to grow up too fast, the third is trying to absolve himself of former sins, and the fourth is trying to reconcile her use of magic and the bad guy’s use of magic.

@JustSarah: The reactions of multiple characters to similar thematic elements is a great way to layer depth into the story by presenting different viewpoints of the same subject.

@Lauren: Subplots are often about minor characters, but they don’t *have* to be. Many subplots belong entirely to the MC.

@Daniel: What you’re describing *could* very well be subplots, depending on how you treat them. But they also sound like each character’s primary quest to discover his greatest need – and thus fulfill his character arc.

I definitely have an emotional subplot in my latest book “Deserto rosso” (“Red Desert”). While the story is about the colonization of Mars and the problems the protagonist (and the rest of the crew) encounters during the mission, she has to face a lot of emotional stuff as well. For instance she is quite intolerant against men from Middle East as her father is from that part of the world and abandoned her mother when she was pregnant. Her mother kinda brianwashed her about this kind of men. And now she founds herself having to share the rest of her life in a desert planet with other four people, and one of them is of that kind… oops!That would force her to face her fears and cause a growing in the character, which will bring to an acceptance of her origins and even to like them.But that’s just a subplot, the whole story is about a menace for human kind hidden in Mars!

I’ve always found subplots to be hard for me to implement, though I have been successful once or twice..My latest story has no DISTINCT subplot, though, thinking it over.. I realize I have put just a tiny bit of a subplot… guy who’s always been weak as a kid, tries to prove that he can hold his own.Actual plot is a plan of revenge on the death of his father.

Honestly… I haven’t worked anything on that story for a while.I’m currently engaged in creating a thorough background.. history, technology, traditions, relations… for another sci-fi story (and I don’t even have a plot for it yet. :eyeroll:). Not technically considered story-writing, ‘cuz this is dull stuff.. like you’d find in a history book.. 😉

Yes, my new story has an emotional subplot and it is adding so much depth to the story. It’s actually gluing the story together. Every page there is a few words on the subplot, and I hope the reader will stick with the book for many reasons, but the subplot will make them want to keep reading.

I have not figured out if I am going to resolve the subplot or let it hang, and that’s the beauty of a subplot, it’s not the main plot so you can resolve them or not.

Another great suggestion from you. I’ve said it before but I am amazed at how often something you are focusing on comes up in my writing, at the same time. Spooky. Thanks KM.

In many ways, emotional subplots *are* the glue. Whether they’re the driving force of the plot or not, they’re often the thing that makes it matter. Hornblower’s stories could have happened without his emotional subplot, but his adventures at sea wouldn’t have held nearly as much meaning without the context of his domestic life on shore.

My current WIP definitely has an emotional subplot – a romance one, no less. But the romance is tricky, with a male character in a setting where he is surrounded by females, but with enormous emotional baggage from how women (particularly his mother) have treated him in the past. It’s a great way to explore issues of trust and emotional distancing with the main character without divorcing ourselves too much from the main plot, since it involves heated engagements with primary characters in the main plot anyway.

As a younger reader, I had issues with subplots since often I found them to be distractions and essentially padding, drawing out the word count of a story to make it a viable novel without adding much depth to the primary story. As ever, it annoyed me to see this flaw frequently got to the publishing stage, and I went through a bit of a phase thinking that subplots were simply a crutch for weak stories. Having been exposed to much better renditions, though, I have come to understand their enormous value and how entertaining and rewarding it can be to watch the subplot threads tie together as a story reaches its climax.